# open-telemetry/opentelemetry-operator

Kubernetes Operator for OpenTelemetry Collector

Repository: https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-operator
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/opentelemetry-operator
Language: Go
License: Apache-2.0
License Family: permissive
Topics: opentelemetry, opentelemetry-collector, kubernetes-operator, hacktoberfest
Last push: 2026-08-26T17:45:06+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 99/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 99, release rhythm 98, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 2450, "days_push": 7, "days_rel": 16, "gap_med": 12, "n_releases_24m": 50}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 1748, forks 649 (observed 2026-08-28T04:05:30.943637+00:00)

## What it is
A Kubernetes Operator written in Go that manages the lifecycle of OpenTelemetry Collector instances and auto-instrumentation of workloads via custom resource definitions. It also provides components like the Target Allocator for distributing Prometheus scrape targets and an OpAMP Bridge for remote collector management.

## Use cases
- deploy and manage OpenTelemetry Collector instances on Kubernetes
- automatically inject OpenTelemetry auto-instrumentation into application pods
- run collectors as sidecars, daemonsets, or deployments via CRDs
- distribute Prometheus scrape targets across collector replicas
- remotely configure collectors with OpAMP
- upgrade and scale telemetry pipelines declaratively

## When to choose
- you run workloads on Kubernetes and want managed OpenTelemetry Collectors
- you want zero-code auto-instrumentation injected into pods
- you need declarative CRD-based telemetry pipeline configuration
- you want Prometheus target discovery balanced across collector instances

## When to avoid
- you are not running Kubernetes
- you prefer manually deploying collectors with plain manifests or Helm
- you need a standalone collector outside a cluster
- you only need client-side SDK instrumentation without a collector

## Facets
- artifact type: service
- maturity: active
- function: monitoring, tracing, deployment, container-orchestration, infrastructure-as-code
- domain: monitoring, cloud-computing
- platform: go, cloud, self-hosted
- tags: opentelemetry, kubernetes-operator, observability, auto-instrumentation, opamp, target-allocator, crd, devops, containers, kubernetes, docker

## Member repositories
- open-telemetry/opentelemetry-operator (main) score 99

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:05:30.943637+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T03:28:54.459953+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-operator (fetched 2026-08-28T04:05:30.943637+00:00, sha b20f5ef9fae1)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.